Leveraging transboundary science to support Northeast Pacific fisheries and protected species management

Climate change is impacting marine ecosystems in increasingly rapid and unpredictable ways. The spatial extent of these impacts on marine fisheries and endangered and threatened species often spans regional and international boundaries. The transboundary nature of changing ocean conditions can challenge detection and anticipation of changes, and delay coordinated actions at the scales required to mitigate and respond. Here, we identify challenges and opportunities for transboundary science in the Northeast Pacific Ocean. Specifically, we aim to support the management of fisheries and protected species in response to a changing climate, while highlighting successful efforts. Challenges include (1) limited coordination of monitoring surveys; (2) institutional, cultural, and technological barriers to the sharing of data and analytical tools; (3) incomplete understanding of relationships among oceanographic conditions, trophic interactions, population dynamics, and species’ distributions; (4) limited availability of high-resolution Earth system model projections that can be linked to ecosystem and fishery responses; and (5) differing prioritization of ecosystem information and limited communication among nations. Three opportunities to overcome these challenges include (1) coordinated monitoring and sharing of data at a transboundary scale to detect and understand marine ecosystem responses to climate change; (2) common assessment frameworks and modeling approaches to improve understanding and projections of ecological responses to climate change; and (3) increased communication of ecosystem information to support management needs across jurisdictions, enhance the use of existing science products, and strengthen pathways for science to inform management of marine resources. We focus on examples of these opportunities drawn from our collective experience as government scientists working on Northeast Pacific Ocean ecosystems. We suggest that by strategically focusing on these opportunities, transboundary science worldwide can improve predictions of ecosystem responses to climate change and better support regional and international management of shared resources.